Event # 4: Basketball, The Sport

Today Tuesday, November 22, 2011, I went to watch the basketball game between the Briar Cliff – Chargers against the Doane – Tigers.

During its development I was sitting next to a neighbor from the residence and I was able to recognize some of my life aspects that I had not remember from childhood (when I used to play basketball).

At the beginning, our team the Chargers was really good and we were up for more than 12 points.  Later on, the team got distracted and maybe overconfident, we begin to fail on the scoring and the other team began to catch up. By the second half, the Tigers had catch up, and after a while they were with more than 20 points ahead.  

Thanks to the game, I remembered how special is the relationship between each one of the teammates  (between them and also with coach).

As the plot of the game went on, I was able to see how the players placed all their energy in their shots and passes, and how each one of them created a unique conception of a game inside their minds.  In their eyes the objective was focused in scoring, but outside of it, the mind of the players was at other place.  Some of them, were probably thinking about the coach’s pressure, feeling the directions of his voice on their minds.  Others were maybe thinking about their relationship to the audience, to their team or to their family and friends who were at the bleachers.  Others, perhaps moved to their future success as basketball players, they even thought about their physical world and their connection to the ball.  

This and much more, connected the 31 individuals with their teams.  Inside a place where millions of feelings were all carried by a single ball.

In every second and every point, there was a pursued experience of sports and there is an achieved feeling of timelessness during action.

At the end when the players are inside the court, the only thing that matters is the satisfaction of making the sport happen.  Your goal becomes nothing else but the connection of your team against your opponent’s.

Is Francis's Stigmata an example of a miracle or is it false? Think about your answer and give the opposite response

It is a false assertion because there is no way a human can get injuries without having some physical interaction with his/her surrounding.  Still, a stigmata is something we read and hear about.  As a person who believes in science, in proofs and in eye witness I think that this kind of stories will just confuse people and leave them unstable.  Myths are created by stories that appear obscure and unreasonable.  A temporal definition of truth is: reality exposed by the being that agrees with the present facts (internal or external) plus one or several imposition aim.  It might or it might not have an aim but it might only be ego.  Truth is only what humans live by their own and until nothing supernatural occurs to them myths will be unreal.  For the same reason I believe only in experience and logical explanations.  I cannot speak clearly about this subject for the same reason that it is something subjective.  Maybe someone invented the story which became a legend, then a myth, a passion, and  the passion a later becomes a stigmata that will later go back to a myth.  Another probable explanation is that some bad people inflicted the stigmata to him and for his passion, faith and devotion, Saint Francis did not spoke about them.  After this, the people inspired for his relationship to Jesus Christ wrote that his wounds had appeared magically.

Event # 3 - Play: Detestable Madness

Play: Detestable Madness
Briar Cliff University Theater department
Directed by Jenna Soleo-Shanks
Play by Hrotsvit of Gandersheim
Sunday October 29. 7:30pm

I went by myself to the play and I found around some friends I know from around (there were about 30 people inside).  The atmosphere was cool, there was some background music and all the people arriving.
The play was really interesting, in act 1 the story of "Calimachus" talked about a man that fell in love of Drusiana (a chastised married woman) who in response to her moral values was unable to confront her feelings.  Calimachus (Patrick Cisar) did not cared she was married and neither chaste, he was passionate and devoted.  In this part of the play Drusiana (Alyssa Keller) through her dance demonstrated anxiety and martyrdom, she struggled between desire and morality.  She died of repressed passion, and later this together was this same consequence for Calimachus' dead, who was audacious and revealing till the end.
During the play, there were several symbolic characters: a snake, which was representation of evil and sin; Saint John (the priest) who represented morality and faith.  Another character, Fortunatus, who used a mask with a big and exaggerated ugly nose, he was against the system, and represented an immoral and resigned person.  At the end, after Calimachus, Drusiana and even Fortunatus were resurrected.   Fortunatus did not accepted his reality, he did not wanted to overcome his greed and his jealousy so he died once again.
In the second play a story about a Sapientia and her three daughters.   During the play the four of them confronted a Roman Emperor who wanted to change them to their faith.  The three girls named Fides, Spes, and Karitas (from Fidelity, hope, and charity) refused to show any reverence to the king's gods.  As the meaning of their names, they remained faithful to their mother's faith, to Christianity.  After it, they with hope and later with charity, one by one was tortured and killed until their mother was left by herself with the heads of her three daughters.
In words, in action and in dramatic expression, the characters demonstrated feelings and ironies that easily connected to the audience self.  At the end, with a long recitation, the characters all together made the audience feel connected in some way to the cast.  I wish I could have identified what was everything that they said, they where very profound but they used some English that was kind of difficult for me to understand.
As some other events similar to this that I have went before, there was a feeling of satisfaction at the end.  I got to know a little bit more about the human being, about myself and about society around, is part of the feeling that I most liked about it.